The Devil's Reject
by theangelofdoom
Summary: He is their leader, all powerful, all knowing. Erik has become a symbol of darkness and strength for a mysterious cult, and has earned their respect through his merciless ways. Yet there is one who remains his weakness: Christine. EC, Dark, Modern, Leroux
1. An Unwanted Destiny Fulfilled

_"From the moment of birth my destiny was to be alone."_

* * *

_California, 1993_

The light in the cell was too bright and the smell of cleaning solution burned what little nasal lining that he possessed. Within hours of the death of his classmate, Erik Ramsey had been arrested and imprisoned. Though, he conceded, it was better than outside. Beyond the gates of the jail, he knew what awaited him.

The media with their cameras, questions, and expressions of horror. He could only be thankful no cameras had been present during his arrest...and only pray that there would be none in the future.

His entire life he had tried to avoid people, tried to accept his differences. It was _they_ who would not let him. Those people outside with the stares, whispers, laughter.

If they had not taken the mask, it would have been alright. If only they had been content with their curiosity...if only _they_ had not seen...

Undoubtedly _she_ would hear of it now. She would know that lay beneath his mask. She would laugh, as _they _had laughed.

"Christine," he whispered her name, and closed his eyes, thinking of her sweet voice. The smile that would never be for him, the eyes that could only pity and hate, nothing more. Love had it's price, and today Erik had paid in full.

"Erik Ramsey?"

He didn't respond to the voice outside the cell. Let them come...if only he were a few years older...then the state would end what he could not. If he had been eighteen instead of seventeen, if only this were not California, but Texas.

"Your mother has come to see you," the voice said again.

For a moment he considered telling them that he was not accepting visitors, no matter who it might be. There was nothing anyone could say to comfort him, and there never had been – but the coldness of the cell was getting to him. He was used to being alone, but not like this. Never at the mercy of strangers, although for most of his life he had expected to find himself right here – trapped like an animal.

"I'm coming," he finally said, getting to his feet.

The guard did not look at him as he unlocked the door, and Erik did not look at anyone during the brief walk to the visiting room.

The expression on his mother's face when she saw him led before her in chains was almost comical, but Erik knew it was not the sight of him helpless that made her pale.

They had taken his mask, and he was left with nothing to cover his face. Unless he wished to destroy the only pillow in his cell and place the slip over his head, then unmasked he would remain.

"Oh God, Erik," Madison Ramsey breathed. "What have you done?"

He stared at her. "You think I intentionally killed someone, Mother?"

"The news is saying-"

"You watch the news?" he asked sullenly. "I'm surprised you remember how to work a television, or that we have one."

Madison glanced nervously at her watch. "I don't have very long. They didn't want to let me in."

"You're my mother and I am a minor. They can't keep you away from me."

She bit her lip. "Ethan is outside in the car. He didn't want me to come."

He lifted his shoulder, refusing to be hurt. It didn't come as a surprise that her visit would not be one of concern, but rather, her making excuses for why she would not be here in the future. He knew then that this would be the last time she visited him in this place. "Will you at least bring me a mask?"

For a moment the hard gaze of his alcoholic mother softened, and she nodded once. "Did they...are you...hurt...?"

"No."

"Good...that's good..."

He waited for her to say something else, but there was only a vacant stare behind her eyes. He could tell she had been drinking, although her speech was not slurred and she was sitting perfectly straight. Impulsively he raised his hand to the glass, feeling an edge of terror at the unknown. In his mother he could not find comfort, but the idea of her, of the knowledge of what she should have represented.

And he did not flinch or even move when Madison stood and turned away from her son's desperate plea for comfort.

"I will have someone bring you a mask, Erik," she said softly.

And then she was gone.

- - - - -

"What did you see, Miss Sorelli?" Detective Navin Kohn asked gently.

She shuddered, and her mother squeezed her shoulders. "Go on, girl. Tell him what you told me."

"The...the boys at school...," she whispered, heedless of the tears that slipped down her cheeks. "They pretended to be his friend. They invited him to a party..."

"Him? You mean Erik Ramsey?"

Kate nodded. "I wasn't supposed to be there. I was staying at a friend's house...and she wanted to go." She looked up at her mother. "I'm so sorry, Mama. I..."

"Shhh...it's okay. Just tell the detective what you saw," Mrs. Sorelli said, knowing she could not punish her daughter for the night's events. It was enough that Kate had seen someone die, and God knows it was enough that her daughter was otherwise alright.

"They gave him a beer...they laughed when he said he couldn't drink because of the mask. They asked him why he didn't take it off..."

"And what did Erik say?"

"He said...well...that he was too handsome and didn't want to make them jealous," Kate said, remembering how she had giggled at his remark, even knowing it was probably a lie. Erik always said things like that to people who asked about the mask. He had never let anyone touch him in the three months of high school that she had known him, and that line had been crossed ten fold in one fateful evening. "The boys on the football team wouldn't let up. They kept asking him about it...then one of them...one of them took it away."

She pressed her hands over her mouth, remembering that gruesome sight. Those eyes, sunken in, the skull visible across the top and to the side. His nose...well...there had been no nose! Worst of all was the mouth which did not seem to have lips, only teeth. It had not made her scream as the other girls. The look in his eyes as he stood in the middle of that room should have been enough to silence any sound at all.

Phillip Chaney had stood there holding the mask in one hand, a beer in the other, and had not said anything either.

"What happened then?"

"Erik hit Phillip and knocked him down...and then another boy...I can't remember who...hit Erik from behind. Phillip climbed on top of him and started punching his face." Kate closed her eyes, "Erik grabbed something on the floor and hit Phillip with it. Only...it sank into his neck..."

"A busted beer bottle," Detective Kohn murmured.

"It sounds to me as if this boy did nothing wrong," Mrs. Sorelli said.

Detective Kohn's mouth tightened. It sounded the same to him, but his partner had called a few minutes ago and said that another version of the events was being spread around, and they did not cast Erik Ramsey in a favorable light. Navin Kohn was certain that nothing ever would. "Is there anything else, Miss Sorelli?"

She stared at him dully. Could she tell him how Erik's eyes had met hers before he had fled from the room? How he'd stared down at Phillip in horror, with Phillip's blood soaking his shirt, covering his face...

Should she tell him that as he had turned away from the sight that he had laughed...

_Laughed? _

God yes, he had laughed over Phillip's dead body.

Then said, in a voice that froze the night, "Call the police. I've finally killed someone."


	2. A Prison Without Bars

**I have yet to hear what you think! Don't be afraid to review, and I promise I won't beg for them every chapter!**

* * *

_"You think because I look like a monster it is inevitable that I should behave like one." _

He was immediately arraigned, a black mask firmly in place as he stood beside his public defender. Behind him, Erik could hear his mother, crying piteously.

She was not crying because her son was being tried for murder.

No...Madison Ramsey had found a sympathetic eye in the media spotlight, given her remarkable performance as the mother of an ungrateful, sadistic child. Erik had watched her wailing figure as Ethan drug her into the courthouse, away from the cameras that eagerly captured her beautiful, betraying face.

"Erik Alexander Ramsey, do you understand these charges as I have read them to you?" the Judge asked, staring down from her pulpit.

"Yes," he answered in a monotone voice.

"And how do you plead?"

The murmurs in the courtroom earned an immediate banging of the gavel.

"Silence! If I do not have order in my court, I will have those few that remain escorted out of here! Mr. Ramsey, how do you plead?"

_Guilty, guilty, guilty. _The words rang out in his mind. He'd wanted to kill Phillip that night. Wanted it...and somehow it had happened. Somehow he'd cut his throat and not even known it, somehow his hands were covered in blood.

What would _she_ think of him now? Christine, so beautiful in her simple skirt and blouse as she stayed outside on the porch, talking with Meg. He could have easily joined her instead of going inside, with everyone staring. The only reason he had gone to that damned party...the only reason he'd continued to go to school occasionally was because of _her_. He could have dropped out and gotten his diploma another way...but it would have meant letting her go.

Even though he knew nothing could ever come of his affection for Christine, he had stayed, continuing to watch, to_ listen._

"Not guilty," he finally said.

The order of the court was broken, and Erik was led back to his cell to await the trial.

* * *

"How well did you know this boy?" Gus Dally asked his daughter as they left the courthouse. 

"Not at all," she replied softly. "No one knows him. He doesn't ever speak to anyone."

"Is he...was he ever violent before that night?"

"No, Papa," Christine said, glancing up at her father. Erik had never been violent at school. He was extremely quiet, very shy, and always sad. Sometimes she caught him staring at her, and once or twice it seemed he wanted to speak, but he never had. "Why? Are you thinking of representing him?"

Gus looked up as Erik Ramsey walked down the stairs amid screams from reporters, his head down, his shoulders hunched, his hands covering the mask and face alike. So young, and so filled with tragedy. Thankfully his daughter had not actually witnessed the death of her classmate, and Gus was equally glad that she had not seen Erik Ramsey stripped defenseless. He wondered what lay behind the mask, although somehow it no longer mattered. As a parent, he had heard plenty of complaints from teachers and other parents alike about the boy who was in all ways, quite simply odd, but had never given much thought to the boy himself.

Now it seemed he was on his own...at such a young age. Something beckoned Gus Dally...aroused two decades worth of fighting for justice. If anyone needed a champion, it was Erik.

"Would it bother you if I did?" he questioned, his tone hesitant.

God only knew why he was offering. Although he was a trial lawyer, he tended to stay away from high profile cases like this. Especially ones that would directly involve his daughter. She could be called as a witness in this, in which case he would be forced to find co-counsel to question her. From the statement Christine had given police, she had been standing outside talking to Meg Greene when the screaming began and a blood soaked Erik ran out another door into the yard. If she were able to offer anything, it would be minor.

"Could you help him?" Christine asked.

Gus turned away from the sight of Erik climbing into the back of a prison van, and looked at his daughter. "Do you think he meant to kill that boy?"

She shook her head without hesitating.

"Then I will help him, Christine," Gus said.

And thus he sealed Erik's fate...and that of his daughter's...forever.

* * *

"Ramsey, your new attorney is here." 

Erik glanced up, his eyes narrowing on the bald little man in a black suit. "Another one already? My, this just keeps getting better and better."

"Open the door," the man said quietly.

"Sir, I don't think that's a good idea," the guard said nervously.

"Open the door," he repeated, his tone indicating he would not accept anything less than immediate compliance.

Erik swung his long legs over the side of the bed, on his feet as he recognized Christine's father. "Mr. Dally!" he exclaimed without thinking.

Gus stepped through the door in surprise. "You know who I am?"

Behind the mask, those yellow eyes became guarded. "You are Christine Dally's father," he stated, unemotionally this time. "I've seen you pick her up from school."

"Sir, I wouldn't recommend going inside there. He's an animal," the guard said, refusing to close the door.

"He's just a boy," Gus said sharply, and reached out and closed it himself. "Go away, I need to speak with my client."

"It's your funeral," he muttered, and locked the door before leaving.

Gus returned his gaze to Erik, who was standing with his fists clenched tightly at his sides. Ignoring the tension and hostility emanating from his thin figure, Gus sat down on the narrow cot and removed a tape recorder from his soft leather briefcase. "I wanted to leave you a notepad and some paper, but the guards said you were not allowed to have pencils any longer. Care to tell me about that?"

"My first attorney recommended it to the warden," Erik said, glancing away. "Why are you here? Are you really...are you really my new lawyer?"

"Yes, if you will let me," Gus answered, studying the unnatural yellowed skin of Erik's neck, then the skeletal hands that still remained clenched. "You do know that my daughter was there that night, don't you?"

Erik visibly tensed. "I saw her," he said vaguely.

"Phillip Chaney's girlfriend, a Miss Kate Sorelli, saw what happened. She said that you didn't attack Phillip Chaney from behind, as the prosecution is claiming. She said that you were underneath him, being hit in the face."

"Maybe she lied," Erik replied with a shrug. "It hardly matters. They're going to condemn me. The Chaney's are a powerful family...and I did kill him."

"Why would she lie? Phillip _was_ her boyfriend. And I like to believe that justice can be served, no matter what parties are involved."

Erik resisted the urge to call him a fool. He'd heard this before from three different public defenders in as many months. 'Trust the system' they would say, only to have the prosecution draw on his obvious mental instability, caused by his birth defect. His trial was set to begin in a week, and there was nothing in his defense except the testimony of one girl, Phillip's girlfriend, and his own word, which meant nothing.

"I'll need you to give me your testimony first. I will leave this tape recorder and you may go over it tonight. We'll pick it apart tomorrow, discard what is not necessary; strengthen what is. I'd like to speak to some of your relatives, if it's possible..."

"Yeah," Erik laughed bitterly. "Go speak to my mother. You'll find her at a bar called Brick's under the interstate."

Gus could hardly be surprised by this. Erik lived in a very rough section of town, and from what he had seen of Madison Ramsey, was not to his liking. She was a complete sot, and came to the courtroom every day with bleached hair and makeup caked on so thick that it seemed to grease everything about her face. Black eyes, coated with black mascara that ran down her face at the whim of tears, making her look somewhat like a weeping evangelists' wife.

"What about your father?"

"If you can find out who he is, then you are more than welcome to speak with him," Erik replied simply. "Or you can talk to Ethan. He's the closest thing to a father I will ever have."

At this, he seemed to be smiling behind that mask, but Gus did not think it was in fondness. Ethan Little, who in no way resembled his name, had to be only a slightly better candidate for parent than Madison. From what Gus could tell, he was not nearly as in the bottle as much as Erik's mother, but seemed to be constantly suppressing an urge to hit something.

"Would you care to tell me what happened that night? In your own words, of course," Gus prompted.

"It won't matter, Mr. Dally," Erik said quietly. "They won't believe anything I say over that of the people at that party."

"You forget that my daughter was there-"

"Even if there were anything useful for Christine to add, they will claim that as my attorney, you have told her what to say."

The direct gaze was unnerving, and Gus shook himself slightly. "She gave her testimony before I offered my services. If the judge does not have a problem with my representing you, then I see no conflict of interest on my part."

"Why do you want to represent me?" Erik demanded suddenly, straightening to his full height. "You have no idea whether I am truly guilty or not, so why? Is this an attempt to boost your career, Mr. Dally? Because I assure you, that will not happen! I am going to be in jail for the rest of my life!"

"Not if you cooperate with me, and help your defense in the process," Gus said mildly, disturbed by the loss of reality that fled so quickly from Erik's eyes. "I will leave you the tape recorder. Take your time – not too much time – the trial is coming up quickly. I need to know everything, Erik. From the time they extended the invitation, until the time of the...tragic accident."

"Accident?" Erik scoffed. "Is that what you think will get me out of this? Claim it was an accident, and everything will turn out fine? Mr. Dally, you are mistaken."

"It was not premeditated, was it?"

Erik glared at him. "No."

"Then it was in self defense. Had that been a regular bottle, not a broken one, then Mr. Chaney might have had a terrible headache, nothing more. It was unfortunate, then, that the bottle was broken, something you would not have known as you were getting the senses beaten out of you. Therefore...an _accident," _Gus stated firmly. "I know this is hard for you. I believe that you did not willingly commit murder."

Erik looked away, feeling strange inside. "You shouldn't believe that. You shouldn't ever think that about me."

Gus knew before this was over, his heart was going to break from this boy. There was everything and nothing to say to comfort him; the right words eluded him even though he could form what needed to be said. Had anyone ever taken a chance on him? Was the entire world to hate him, for something he could not control?

"Erik...I would also like to see your medical records. I suppose I will need your mother's permission to-"

"No!"

Startled, Gus got to his feet, staring up at the boy who towered over him by at least a foot. "It will help your case..."

"I will not allow myself to be dicussed in that manner!" he snapped. "Find another way."

"The prosecution will use it to their advantage," Gus said, his gaze softening. "I think it would be best if we had someone talk to you; perform tests."

"Tests?" Erik repeated, his tone deceptively soft. "Tests, Mr. Dally? I assure you, there will be no tests."

"I meant psychological tests...not physical tests," Gus amended quickly. "Surely you have no problem with that? I've spoken to your teachers. They assure me you are quite intelligent."

Erik shrugged one shoulder. "There is nothing remarkable about my intelligence."

"You've attended school roughly ten percent of the school year, and passed each midterm with _perfect_ scores. There appears to be nothing beyond your grasp. What I can't find are records from your previous schools..."

"You won't either," Erik replied coolly. "No one will."

Gus was again unnerved by his assuredness, by the calmness that could vanish without any warning at all. There was something dark within this boy, and Gus could tell the struggle was almost over. If Erik was truly innocent of this crime, then he would do everything in his power to ensure the boy was set free. It was the least that he could do.

The boy was already imprisoned in one way or another.


	3. The One

I did not have room in my summary, but I need to mention that there may be influences from Kay. Oh yeah, and I don't own anything in this story. Nothing. Zip. Zero. Zilch. Don't sue me. Except for a few original characters. Most will relate to the book in some way, but not all of them. And don't worry, this will not revolve around the trial, although it will play a key part in the beginning of my story.

"_Hell is not a place, it's a state of mind and body; Hell is an obsession with a voice, a face, a name." _

- -

"Your honor, the prosecution feels that it would be in the best interests of our case to have the defendant, Erik Ramsey, remove his...mask. It hides his expression from the jurors, and without that hint of humanity, or lack thereof, we do not feel this will be a fair trial."

"Objection!" Gus shouted vehemently, shooting out of his chair. "Your Honor, my client will not feel comfortable-"

"Mr. Dally, sit down!" the Judge ordered, banging her gavel. "I am tired of your dramatics in my courtroom. If you have an objection, there is no need for the display of hostility."

"Your Honor-"

"Mr. Ramsey, I have not brought up this issue myself," the Judge said, cutting Gus off, "but I too feel that it would serve the best interests of the court if we were able to gauge your reactions."

Erik stood up slowly and placed his palms on the wooden table, and stared at the Judge. "Come and take it, then."

"Erik, sit," Gus said sharply. He looked to the Judge, whose mouth was hanging open. "Your Honor, may I approach the bench?"

She blew out a loud breath, partly surprise, partly a release of anger. "I think you had better, Mr. Dally. You as well, Ms. Crow."

The prosecuting attorney stormed across the room, hissing beneath her breath before she got there. "Your Honor, this juvenile delinquent has disrespected the authority of this court! I demand that he..."

"Be thrown in jail?" Gus cut in. "Your Honor, what my client suffers from goes beyond anything this courtroom has ever seen. Showing his face to you and everyone else will damage what little faith he has in the world. It could well destroy it."

"Mr. Dally, we do not permit anyone else to hide their face," the Judge said quietly. "Give me a good reason why I should allow your client that privilege."

It was on the tip of his tongue to say a good enough reason was the death of a teenage boy, but he kept his thoughts to himself. He could feel Erik behind him, his golden eyes burning holes into the back of his head, and Gus knew his daughter was watching as well. Christine had said nothing to him about the case, and Gus could not have discussed it even if his daughter had wanted to.

This was day one of what would surely be a long and drawn out case, and in no way was it going to be open and shut. Erik himself would complicate matters given the opportunity, as he had just done by challenging the Judge.

"I have spoken to Erik's mother about his mask, and she told me that from the time he was an infant, she has forced that mask on his face. I have arranged for him to speak with a psychiatrist, who will show that removing it at this point in his life...or rather, having it forcibly removed, will cause irreparable harm to his state of mind. Please, your Honor, consider this very carefully," Gus whispered. "That mask is the only protection Erik has ever had from this world. When I prove his innocence, he will still have to live in society. If he chooses to always wear the mask, and I believe he will, it could undermine his right to privacy. I believe that whatever is beneath it will be quite unforgettable. And the press...I don't think I need to mention that he his a minor..."

"Alright, Mr. Dally, alright," the Judge said, giving a little sigh.

"Your Honor!"

"Quiet, Ms. Crow. I have made my decision, and it is final," the Judge said firmly.

Gus breathed deeply, relieved, and turned to Erik with a smile. The boy immediately slumped into his chair, and Gus knew that if the Judge had ruled another way then there would have been serious problems.

"Mr. Ramsey, the mask can stay, but if you ever speak disrespectfully to me again, the punishment will be severe. Do you undestand?"

Gus sent Erik an imploring look when he only gazed back at the Judge, his eyes unwavering and unforgiving that anyone should dare mention that he remove the mask.

"Mr. Ramsey, did you hear me?"

"Yes, your Honor," Erik replied slowly. "I heard you."

No one missed the fact that he did not agree with the Judge's first question.

- -

* * *

Andras refolded his hands across the table, and glanced serenely up at the new recruit. "You are to kneel before me, Kevin," he reminded him kindly. "Don't forget your manners." 

"Of course," the boy whispered, dropping immediately onto his knees. "Forgive me."

"This once," Andras said reproachfully. "Bow your head, and tell me why Lina sent you into my chamber."

Kevin complied again, trembling inside and out. "She says there is a murder case happening in America right now. A boy...a little older than me...she says he is special."

"What is so special about him?" Andras asked, sitting forward intently. Lina did not normally take an interest in recruits, considering them far beneath her...although she had only been here three years. Ah, his dark little princess. She had learned quickly, and continued to please him more each day.

"He wears a mask," Kevin replied, his gaze trained on Andras's feet. "It is said that he hides a grotesque disfigurement."

"A mask?" Andras raised a black sharpened nail to his chin. "Interesting, to say the least. And is he guilty of murder?"

"Everyone thinks so, but he has pled not guilty."

"Where is this young man again? America?"

"California," Kevin confirmed. "His name is Erik Ramsey."

"Erik," Andras repeated. He leaned back against his throne, the conduit to a dark god to those who believed. "Erik Ramsey. I look forward to meeting you...soon."

- -

The day of Kate Sorelli's testimony, Erik's case suffered a crushing blow. Ms. Crow had begun by asking simple questions to Miss Sorelli, such as her name, where she went to school, and her age.

It was when she asked Kate how she knew the victim, Phillip Chaney, that the girl burst into tears.

Once composed, Ms. Crow pressed on. "Can you tell the court what happened that night?"

Gus held his breath. As his personal witness, he had gone over the testimony countless times with Kate, judging her to be the cornerstone of his case, and a strong one at that.

"I s-saw Erik Ra-Ramsey...attack Phillip from behind...and stab him..."

"Objection!" Gus screamed out.

"Silence!" the Judge demanded, giving him a withering glare. "Mr. Dally, you cannot object to the witness's testimony!"

"This is not her testimony!" Gus thundered. "This is not what we discussed!"

"Mr. Dally, I will hold you in contempt!"

Gus sat heavily back in his chair, and tried not to glare at the sobbing young girl on the stand. "This is not what she told the police," he muttered beneath his breath. "This is wrong...wrong..."

"Be quiet, Mr. Dally," Erik said calmly. "You should have known this would happen."

Gus turned to him in shock. "You cannot be serious."

"And you," Erik replied, studying him carefully, "will learn that my life has no meaning to these people. They need someone to blame, and I am so easily condemned."

Gus stood again, shaken by Erik's acceptance of hatred. "Your Honor, I would like to remove Miss Sorelli from my witness list. She has given a statement to me and to the police that contradicts what she has just told this court. I would like the jurors to disregard everything that she has said here today."

"Are you accusing her of lying on the stand, Mr. Dally?"

"Yes, I believe that I am."

Kate said nothing, and looked at no one.

In the back of the courtroom, Phillip Chaney Sr. met the contemptuous eyes of Mrs. Sorelli. In a mocking gesture he tapped the pocket of his jacket, where beneath lay a wallet that was several thousand dollars lighter.


	4. Heart Stopping Moments

_**Hope you are enjoying the story so far! Just to note, most of the quotes at the beginning will be from Kay. If you have any questions, I will do my best to answer them. And don't forget to review! They are better than chocolate or sex! **_

_"I had long since learned to love the kindly veil that shielded me from hating eyes."_

* * *

Lying awake in his cell, Erik recalled the first time he heard Christine. The sweet, lifting voice had imprinted a clawing sensation on his stomach and heart. It had been so beautiful and pure that he'd resisted the urge to cover his ears, certain that someone like him did not deserve to hear such a heavenly voice. 

The fair, usually held during the middle of May near the docks, had been crammed with people. It was California, and no one paid much attention to the solitary figure in black, prowling along the edges of a funhouse. Erik had only gone inside for the mirrors, to study them, if not himself, and memorize the angles. There was something he wanted to build, and yet he was unsure of himself. Did he truly want to design something using material that he hated? Would that appease his creative, inquisitive mind, or simply be another device for him to destroy upon completion?

He had almost made up his mind to leave when he heard _her_...

_"No light shall pass, this darkness reigns. Forever love, eternal love..."_

The words called to him, but it was the _voice_ that drew him through the crowd. It was the voice which made him want to weep at his own misfortune.

And it was the figure which stilled his breath and caused a sudden rage at being so hideously formed

Damn her, he'd thought almost savagely. Damn her for being there at that moment...for changing his life, for making him want something that he could never, _ever_ have.

_"Come, lay your head with mine. Love me, eternal love..."_

Christine, although at the time he had not yet learned her name, stood on a platform beneath a spot light. In the evening glow, with her golden hair spilling down her waist, and wide blue eyes lifted to a darkening sky, she was perfect. Something melted the hardness around his heart, tugged at what little innocence that Erik had left.

He listened to her song, and before the night was over had found out where she lived. By the next evening, he had known much, much more. Though he did not quite understand the inexplicable urge to discover everything about this girl, he did not question it. Seldom did he repress an urge when it was this strong, and with Christine Dally, it seemed he had no choice.

Three months later he had badgered his mother into enrolling him in school, much to Ethan's amusement. It was perhaps the one time that Madison gave in to something without bothering to learn the reason why.

And now with this hanging over his head, Erik knew that the very slim chance Christine might have ever had in at least befriending him was gone.

Still, he could not ignore the persistent voice that whispered in his ear, bumping softly against his shattered confidence.

_"Why is Gus Dally representing you? And what does _she_ think of it?"_

* * *

"Look it's her," someone whispered. "The girl whose father is representing that freak." 

Christine stiffened in rage, but did not turn around to face the speaker of that vile insult. It was now a month into the trial – well over two months since the death of Phillip Chaney – and it was growing harder to ignore them. Threatening notes had been found in her locker and the police had been called on more than one occasion to disband one group of zealots from their front yard who were intent on having Erik Ramsey punished in the worst possible manner.

The only person who spoke kindly to her anymore was Meg, which was why it surprised Christine as she hurried down the hallway, that Kate Sorelli called after her.

"What do you want?" Christine asked, narrowing her eyes. "I'm late for American History."

"Please," Kate panted, out of breath. "I just need to give you this..."

Kate pressed a slip of paper into her hand, and then rushed away, leaving Christine standing in a crowd of suddenly curious people.

She intentionally shouldered through the thickest of them and walked down the hall to her class. As Mr. Thomas droned on about The New Deal, Christine opened the note and read it quickly.

_"Tell your father I am sorry. Everyone has a price. I don't know if you can find it, but there is a videotape of what happened that night. Only a few people know about it, and it is in the hands of the Chaney family, so your father may never be able to use it. Kate."_

Christine felt her heart slow. Kate had been paid off? By the Chaney family?

"Poor Erik," she whispered.

"Did you say something, Miss Dally?"

Her head jerked up, and she crumpled the note in her hand. "No, Mr. Thomas."

"Are you passing notes in class?"

Slowly she shook her head even as he came down the aisle towards her.

"May I have that?"

"No."

"Miss Dally, give me the note," Mr. Thomas said, glaring down at her.

Around the classroom she could hear people giggling, but she knew that if word of the tape leaked, then it would never help Erik. Somehow she knew that he had not attacked Phillip from behind. She had been crushed when Kate changed her testimony, knowing the devastation that Erik must feel and her father as well. Her father had changed since the trial, in ways she didn't understand. He was bitter, moody, and in some ways sad.

"It's private," Christine said stiffly.

He stuck out his hand, and she crumpled it even tighter in her fist. "If you do not give it to me, then you can go sit in the principal's office."

"Fine," she snapped, and grabbed her book bag off the floor. "I will."

She stormed down to the office without waiting for a hall pass, then plunked herself in a chair before the prune faced secretary.

"That was fast," Mrs. Richardson said, eyeing her with suspicion.

"What was fast?"

At that moment the principal's office door opened, and the police detective who had questioned her after the party stepped out.

"Miss Dally, I'm afraid you are going to have to come with me to the hospital. Your father asked me to come by and pick you up," Detective Kohn said, his expression somber.

"Has something happened?" she asked in a small voice, her anger vanishing immediately. "To my...f-father...?"

The Detective glanced at the secretary, who was listening avidly. "No, Miss. I'm afraid it was his client."


	5. Pity For Erik

"_In darkness you came to me. _

_And in darkness you left..."_

Gus shrank from the sight of Erik's corpse – like figure on the stretcher. The boy was truly a horrifying sight, from his unmasked face to his skeletal ribs. His head lolled to the side, his stick arms draped over the sides and trailing towards the floor.

"What the hell happened to him?" Gus demanded, shaking himself mentally. Now was not the time to gawk at the boy, which was what the doctor and nurses were doing. "He's dying, damn you! Do something! He's just a boy!"

When they continued to stand there, Gus roared,_ "Save him, by God, or I will sue everyone in this hospital for child negligence!"_

At that they certainly did not hurry, but the doctor finally ordered his nurses to check his vitals. Gus watched impatiently as they attempted to resuscitate him, wincing as his strange body became animated when they tried to use a defibrillator on him.

"Doctor, his skin is turning red," one of the nurses stated.

He leaned over Erik slightly and lifted each lid, then sniffed close to those malformed lips. "I think he's been poisoned. Someone get me the antidote kit."

"No," Gus whispered, and leaned against the wall.

His next thought was disturbing, and he immediately pulled himself from the room, angry for even thinking it.

_"What if it were for the best? He looks peaceful..he looks already dead."_

"No," he said again to himself. The boy did not deserve to die that way. Certainly not because the world could not bear to look at him. And dying in this manner, Gus was certain, would be nothing less than murder.

"Mr. Dally?"

He turned, and was surprised to see the Judge coming down the hall, minus her black robes and annoying gavel. "You heard?"

"I came as soon as the warden called."

Gus gestured vacantly into the room, then wished that he hadn't. Erik's body was still displayed for all to see, and the Judge's face twisted in revulsion at the sight of it.

"Oh my God."

"You see why I was so adament?"

"Yes...yes, God yes...," she whispered, and moved past the door so she wouldn't have to look at him anymore. "I should like to thank you for it now. It looks like something from-"

"_It_?" Gus asked sharply.

The Judge closed her eyes, half ashamed, half in agreement. "I'm sorry, Mr. Dally."

"This is not the dark ages," he said furiously. "This is a seventeen year old boy. No matter what he looks like, he deserves the respect of any other human being!"

"What do you want me to think? I dare say the world has never seen anything like Erik Ramsey. He's so damned strange..."

"I hope when you put that robe on, you remember to be unbiased," Gus said coldly, then turned away.

The doctor came out of the room as they stood in the hall, not speaking. "Do either of you know how to get in contact with his relatives?"

"His mother has been notified," Gus replied stiffly. "She isn't coming."

"Not com...," the doctor stopped, and raked a hand through his hair. "I believe he's been poisoned with cyanide. I don't know if he will live or not." He turned back into the room to examine his patient.

"Poisoned?" the Judge gasped. She turned to Gus with wide eyes. "Mr. Dally, this is an outrage!"

"I should say," he said darkly. "Why don't you go ask Phillip Chaney what he knows about it?"

"I hope you are not accusing a former State Senator of attempted murder, Mr. Dally," the Judge said reproachfully. "There are plenty of other people who would do something like this."

"Oh, and I suppose Kate Sorelli's change of testimony had nothing to do with him, nor the fact that her mother just bought a sportscar on a secretary's wages?"

The Judge pressed her hands over her ears. "I can't listen to this. We cannot discuss the case here," she said, glaring at him. "I have to go."

"Wait!" Gus took a deep breath, gathering his courage. "If Erik survives, I want him released into my custody."

"Are you mad?"

"Are you?" he shot back. "If he survives this, then I want him released to my custody. He's not going anywhere. His mother cannot take him, the frigid, unfeeling bitch that she is, and he is not safe behind bars. If you want the truth, I've been expecting a phone call every day saying he'd had his throat slit. He's not safe there!"

She held her hands up, silencing him. "If I let him out...on a very large bail...he will have to be on house arrest unless at trial. A monitoring bracelet will be on his ankle at all times, and two guards will be present wherever he goes."

"Fine."

Gus turned away from her and entered the room. The doctor gave him a disapproving look as he went to the side of the bed, but Gus ignored him as he grasped a bony hand. Feeling a swell of pity for the young, brilliant man who could die so tragically, he wept.

- -

* * *

It felt as if the entire school were staring as Christine climbed into the front seat of Detective Kohn's car. The aging middle eastern man sighed as he put the car in reverse and backed out of a parking spot.

"Have you ever ridden in one of these?" he asked, attempting to break the tension.

Wide eyed, she shook her head.

"You know, if the police had busted that party, you would have," Detective Kohn informed her. "Underage drinking, marijuana..."

"I wasn't doing any of that!" she protested, flushing. "If Meg Giry had not wanted to go, then I most certainly wouldn't have gone!"

"Monkey see, monkey do, eh?" he asked wryly.

Christine bit her lip and stared out the window blankly, until she noticed that they were not going in the direction of any hospital that she knew about. "Where are we going?"

"I have to make a stop first. Erik Ramsey's home," Detective Kohn replied quietly. "Your father asked me to."

"Oh, cause his parents?"

His mouth tightened, but he didn't respond. Madison Ramsey had been the first person he had called, and she had said to call her when Erik died. The boy had not even finished his breakfast this morning before he'd started having seizures and gone into a coma. Nothing so far had revived him, but Navin was hoping that his mother's hopes did not come true. No one, especially someone who had never known a moment's happiness, deserved to die in such a way.

He pulled onto the street in front of an ill reputed apartment building, well known for being used as a crack house, and frowned. "You'll have to come inside with me. This is a bad neighborhood."

Christine glanced suspiciously around, but nodded. Something about Erik drew her curious mind open, and more than anything she wanted to see where he lived. She followed the detective up to the eight floor, pressing her hand over her nose at the strong smell of urine, and waited beside him when he knocked on a door with no number to it.

"Who is it?" a man demanded from inside.

"Detective Navin Kohn, SFPD."

"Yeah? What do you want?"

"I'm here to get Erik's things," he replied, "so open up."

The door swung open, revealing Ethan Little dressed in greasy mechanics clothes. "Make sure you take it all this time. Bury him with it, hell, I don't care!"

With that he walked back to his recliner and proceeded to finish watching _Donahue_.

Christine scurried down the hall after Detective Kohn, nearly clinging to his suit jacket. He snagged an empty box off the kitchen table then entered a bedroom that was only slightly larger than her closet at home.

Compared to the rest of the house, which was a dingy yellow with dirty dishes and trash lying around, this room was neat and clean. The uncarpeted floor was swept, the walls a dark blue, and there was nothing out of place.

"Don't touch anything," he ordered, and turned to a small desk beside the closet.

Keeping an eye on her, Detective Kohn located several things that he had seen during the course of his first search of Erik's room that he thought the boy might want. Four journals filled with hundreds of drawings of some strange mirrored apparatus with mathematical equations written carefully beside each measurement; a picture of his mother, though God knew why he'd kept it; several little devices that Navin thought looked like a rather sophisticated mouse trap...and a silver necklace with a heart on it that had been hidden behind the drawer.

While Christine was standing there, gawking with all the subtlety that a sixteen girl could muster, Navin gathered Erik's clothes, six masks, and three books on opera music.

"He doesn't have much, does he?" Christine asked, her expression one of pity.

"I don't think he could keep anything of value," Detective Kohn said abruptly. "Erik told me during his interrogation that he had a tendency to give any money that he had to his mother, and anything else of value that pig boyfriend of hers took to a pawn shop.

"I feel so sorry for him," she whispered. "I never talked to him at school. I...I didn't know what to say."

Detective Kohn gave her a tired smile. "Sometimes 'hello' is good enough, Miss Dally. Perhaps if Erik makes it through this, you will get your chance."


	6. A Deceitful Master

Someone mentioned this being a highschool fic...while it started out that way, rest assured, it will not stay here. Right now we are in 1993 California, but at some point this will jump ahead to 2007, and Erik will have changed a great deal. He's going to have indulged in all those darker things we all remember from Kay and Leroux, and yet he will still remember Christine, and admire her from a-very-far. Hope you are enjoying...

I posted a forum if you have any questions about where this story is headed, then you can ask them there, or we can talk about any Erik's that you want. And all my quotes so far (I think) have been from Susan Kay's book, Phantom. If you haven't read it, then you'd better before I get a Punjab Lasso out!

* * *

"_Love is a scorpion's paralyzing poison, but now a thousand little mouths are sucking it steadily from my veins..."_

"Christine!" Gus opened the hospital room door and hugged his daughter as hard as he could. "I was worried about you!"

"Papa, what happened to him?" she asked, her voice muffled against his chest.

Gus turned her away before she could see Erik lying there, hooked up to a plethora of machines. "Someone tried to hurt him," he said tersely, then glanced up at Detective Kohn, who was holding a mask. "Put that on him, for God's sakes, before someone else tries to come in here and look."

He held Christine firmly by the shoulders until Detective Kohn announced that Erik was covered.

Christine stared at him, his skeletal, pale body against white sheets. Tubes were running beneath his mask and an IV was hooked into his thin arm. Beneath the lights, Erik looked absolutely horrible, and yet she could not turn away nor be disgusted by his pitiful form.

He was unconscious, and if the beeps on the heart rate monitor were any indication, his pulse was very weak. "Is he going to live?" she whispered.

"I don't know," Gus said, closing his eyes. "He was supposed to visit with a psychiatrist later on today, and I had hoped to get a clearer image of what goes on in that head of his. But now..."

"Mr. Dally, could I see you outside?" Detective Kohn asked.

"I'll just sit here with him, Papa," Christine said, nervously approaching the side of Erik's bed.

Her father and the detective stepped outside into the hall, and Christine looked through the holes of Erik's mask, seeing his eyes were still closed. She breathed easier knowing he was asleep...but worried that he might not wake up.

Then she worried about what she might say if he did wake up...

"Are you sure it's a good idea to take him into your home?" she heard the detective ask.

Immediately Christine turned her head to listen. Her father was going to take him home? If he survived...?

"He's innocent, Detective. I know it; you know it. Nothing during this trial has pointed to anything else."

"Except the testimony of ten or twelve high school students," Detective Kohn reminded him.

"Who hated him, simply because he was different," her father stressed. "Phillip Chaney was a star athlete, a former Senator's son. His brother Raoul is in a special military school on the east coast. Their mother was a close relation to the Roosevelt family! This entire trial has been pitting two variegated families against one another!"

"Don't attempt to convince me," Detective Kohn said quietly. "I feel sorry for the boy. He's got serious issues, but I can see him struggling to be good. I hope he wins the battle – but something tells me a few nights of sitting around watching sitcoms with you and your daughter isn't going to help him."

"I'm not taking him for that, you damned fool! I'm taking him so someone doesn't kill him before he's proven innocent! And yes, maybe I do want to give him a semblance of normalcy! It's more than obvious his mother never tried!"

The door behind them shut, muffling further conversation, and Christine returned her attention to Erik. Softly she began to hum, remembering a song her mother used to sing her to sleep with. The melody started slow and grew to a point where instead of humming, she began to sing...but she suddenly shot out of her chair when the monitor beside the bed began to beep furiously.

Suddenly Erik's back arched off the mattress, and he let out an inhuman groan, his arms trembling off the sides of the bed.

"Stop moving," she whispered, watching the tubes in his arms stretch out. "Oh...don't move..."

"It hurts," Erik whimpered, one hand beginning to claw at his stomach. "Get it off me...get it out of me..."

"Don't move," Christine exclaimed, beginning to panic as he flailed about. "You'll hurt yourself worse!"

His eyes popped open, and he stared at her for a moment, then began to convulse violently.

The door behind her flew open and in moments Erik was surrounded by a doctor and three nurses, who were all trying to physically restrain him to the bed.

Whether it was whatever poison that was working it's way through his system, or the feeling of being held down, Erik began to struggle more, screaming in agony.

"Get off of me! Let me go, damn you! Damn you!"

"Mr. Ramsey, be still!" the doctor said sharply. "Someone get me a sedative!"

"No! No drugs!" he roared, twisting his arms away from the nurses who held them down. He managed to rip out his IV, and became frantic when the doctor touched his mask.

"Who put this on him? How am I supposed to monitor his vitals if I can't see his face? My God, he probably can't breathe with this on!"

"No! No!" Erik knocked one of the nurses down, panting heavily from the exertion, and yet continued to fight them of.

"You're hurting him! Stop it!" Christine suddenly yelled as the doctor began to lay over his torso and pin him to the bed.

Behind her, she could hear her father yelling the same, and she rushed forward, heedless of the violent rage in Erik's eyes.

"Stop...just stop...," she pleaded, and laid a tentative hand on his arm.

Erik stilled completely under her light touch, his breathing heavy, his stomach still feeling as if it were on fire from whatever it was he'd ingested. But she was there...and she was touching him...and he thought he saw tears in her eyes. His beautiful Christine was crying, and Erik lost the battle that had raged inside him for months. He'd tried to fight what he felt for her, but couldn't, and it was the bitterest loss of all.

"Leave. Please just leave," he said weakly. "Let me die. I don't care. Just let me die."

His words tore at her heart, and Christine felt her face crumple in misery. Before she could say another word, her father guided her out into the hallway, where she cried for the boy she did not yet know.

- - -

* * *

"Cyanide, Lina? You always come up with interesting ways to amuse me," Andras said, patting his lap.

Lina crawled into it from the floor, a kitten who needed petted and appeased with words like silk that fell from her lover's lips. "It was too easy," she whispered, "Erik Ramsey was just like all the rest. Did you know that in prison...it is often your fellow inmates that prepare your food? I almost considered it too easy...but at least we got him out of there. If he survives...he will make a great recruit."

Andras growled into her ear. "I am sure you will put him through most rigorous training, my pet. Have you any ideas for him yet?"

"I've heard he is quite clever. He has a fascination with mirrors...he's even tried to build a catoptric cistula. You know I've always wanted one..."

"Ah, yes. I remember. But yours, shall we say, had a twist...?"

"Oh, Andras! I cannot wait to get my hands on this boy!" she said, her dark smile one that gave most shivers of unease. "He's perfect! And when I see beneath that mask...well...I believe he will be the One!"

"Really?" Andras hid his displeasure by tilting her head backwards with his sharpened nails. "Don't you think I should be the person who decides who is the One?"

Immediately her eyes lowered, and she was once again the demure twenty year old girl he had taken in all those years ago. "Of course, sir. But won't it be magnificent if he is...?"

"Certainly," Andras murmured thoughtfully.

If only his followers knew...there was no such person who existed! The One, well, it was believed by all in the organization that He was out there. He, a person of exquisite power and grace, who could command the universe and obedience from all men with a divine_ Voice!_

Andras kissed Lina, and drew her closer to the darkness that rested within him with each whispered word of praise.

If Erik Ramsey turned out to be the One, Andras mused, then he would eat his hat.

* * *

Have I shocked you? Oh! It was not those damned Chaney's after all, was it? Awwwwww. 


	7. Thanking Evil

"_I have often thought I would have been quite happy as a spider."_

* * *

He was floating on a magic carpet, and behind him, the goats steadily chewed at the edges of his vehicle. He was in darkness, and in light, then darkness again. There was no pain, and yet he could feel himself drawing nearer to the source of some secret agony that frightened him and made him cry out. The sounds outside of his head were annoyingly loud, but try as he might, Erik could not open his eyes, nor could he make out the words.

Voices...men...they were standing over him, watching. They were shouting, but said nothing.

Then there was silence, and such a long silence that it too frightened him.

Had he died? Surely not, because he heard the voice of an angel singing...and Erik knew that he'd never make it through the gates of heaven. Perhaps it was a siren, drawing him deeper into hell. He tried again to force his eyes open, but could not, and struggling suddenly against some invisible weight that bound his arms to the bed, he felt a pain slice through his hand.

"You'll rip your IV out again," a pleasant voice said, sounding somewhat cross. "If you don't start behaving, Erik, they will give you more drugs."

"Mmmph," he said, but could not speak. Something covered his mouth and dug into his face at the same time. Erik tried again to lift his arms, but couldn't.

"Calm down," the voice whispered. "You're safe. Don't make them come in here like they did last time."

Suddenly he remembered them holding him to the bed and trying to take the mask..._she _had been there...and _she_ was here now. But hadn't she gone away? A nurse had stuck a needle in his arm, and he'd recalled nothing after watching her walk out the door.

"The doctor says you're going to live," Christine continued speaking. "My father went down to the courthouse to post bail, and we're going to take you to live with us until the trial is over."

Erik finally opened his eyes, forcing his blurred vision to at last focus on the blond angel that stood beside his bed. He opened his mouth to speak again, but there was something inside of it. He could see the mask and feel it there as well, but some sort of devices were going underneath the bottom of it; into his mouth – into what little nose he had.

Could she see anything from this angle? Had she already seen what he hid so desperately?

"Are you in pain?"

He closed his eyes and turned his face away from her, trying to imagine why she was speaking with him. Why was she in here alone? Didn't she know he was a monster?

"Should I get a doctor?"

Erik glared at her. "Mmmph!"

"No?" She seemed to be smiling or laughing at him, which stung. "I don't like doctors either. Or hospitals..."

Erik understood at once. Christine's mother had died from a head injury following a car accident, but she had lingered in a hospital bed for more than three months. Christine had been only six or seven at the time, and he knew it had affected both father and daughter a great deal.

They still visited her grave every Sunday afternoon, and spent the rest of the day together. He'd watched them, wondering what it would have been like if he'd been normal. If his father had stayed around or his mother had loved him.

To a boy who had never known comfort, never known sympathy, it was impossible to imagine why Gus Dally would want to take responsibility for him.

He tried to lift his hand again, only to find it still wouldn't budge. Glancing down, he saw that they had strapped his arms and legs to the bed, and quickly he started to panic.

"Don't move, or you'll tear that blasted IV out again, and I swear if I have to see that again I'm going to be sick!"

"Mmmph!" he retorted ineffectively.

"Here, just stop moving!" Christine said, going to his side.

What harm could it do to release his hands? He was awake now, and hopefully wouldn't struggle like before. Just as she was about to lift the strap from across his arm, she paused.

"Promise me you won't do anything foolish."

Erik glared at her, then down at his hand, silently commanding her to release his restraints. "Mmmph!"

"Ah, yes. Mmmph," she replied. "Does that mean you will behave? Because I'm not about to get in trouble for letting your hands go. And just so you know, there are two police officers outside the door, so don't even think about trying to run."

Refusing to be mocked for another 'mmmph', Erik lay his head back on the bed, and hoped she would take his silence for acquiesance.

"If you get me in trouble...," she muttered beneath her breath, and slowly pulled away the velcro straps.

Beneath them, his arms were red and scraped, as thin as two lengths of rope. The only reason she did not stare now was because she had been doing so for the last four hours while he had been unconscious.

Erik sat up slowly, maneuvering the arm with an IV sticking out of it with great care, and turned to the side. Quickly he tugged down the respirator that was in his mouth, and yanked the nose tubes out.

"Get out," he rasped, his mouth dry, his humiliation now complete. He had nothing to say to her, nothing at all. He'd waited to speak to Christine for so long...wanted to know her voice as well as every thought that entered her mind. Now he wanted nothing more than solitude.

"But-"

"Leave," Erik said over his shoulder, not looking at her. "Go sit outside with the damned police."

"You curse an awful lot."

"You're nosy and irritating," he shot back, and pointed towards the door. Suddenly his hand was snatched backwards, and the machine holding his IV bag slammed to the floor. "Dammit!"

He cradled his bleeding hand against his bare chest, glaring at her as she moved around the room to pick up the machine.

"I told you so," Christine said, giving him a satisfied smile. "Does it hurt?"

"Where is your father?" he asked, deliberately ignoring her.

"I told you, he's gone to post your bail. He's getting you out of jail...before someone really kills you next time."

"Is that what happened?"

Christine's eyes flickered over him, causing further discomfort as they rested on his too thin shoulders and chest. "You were intentionally poisoned with cyanide."

"Shocking."

"It's horrible...I'm...I'm very sorry," she said, not knowing what else to say.

Erik lifted one shoulder, and reached for the blanket. He drew it over his shoulders and wrapped one end of it around his bleeding hand. "Just another day," he replied dismissively. "Where are my clothes?"

Christine pointed to a the box that Detective Kohn had left, and Erik glanced at the door, then back at her.

"Oh! I'll tell everyone you're awake!" she exclaimed, and darted towards the door.

Erik sat there in silence, and in a moment of sheer madness, he thanked whoever had been kind enough to try and end his miserable life...for it brought him closer to Christine Dally than he had ever thought possible.


	8. Diva in the Making

_"...my Eden was full of cruel nettles and vicious thorns..."_

* * *

Raoul de Chagny climbed the stairs, wearily dragging his feet. As soon as he had stepped through the front door, he'd heard his father upstairs, screaming into the telephone. The house was so empty now. Any moment he felt that Phillip would come around a corner, a grin on his face, bragging about how many girls he'd been with or how many touchdowns he had scored at the last game.

He knew his father was angry with himself for allowing Phillip to attend public schools. Phillip had always gotten his way though, and when he'd set his eyes on Bay City High, their father had ultimately relented. While Raoul had gone to Cadet Corps, Phillip had lived the dream of being a regular teenage boy.

Until...

Raoul stopped at the landing, sighed and shifted his bag over his back. Until he'd been murdered, Phillip's life had been next to perfect.

"You tell Ms. Crow I want that freakish boy back behind bars! Do you hear me? He is not to set foot outside of that hospital until it's time for him to go back to prison!"

Then...

"I don't care if someone slits his throat! He killed my...my..."

Rage suddenly left his father's voice, and Raoul heard the distinct sound of the telephone being thrown across the room.

Raoul debated on whether he wanted to slip past the door to his father's home office or not. He had gone back to school right after the funeral and completed the rest of his semester, even though it meant missing a good deal of the trial. Not that he would have missed anything with the media devouring every glory detail of both the death of his brother, and the odd being who had taken his life.

With their mother gone, and their father gone on business for most of their childhood, Phillip and Raoul had been quite close. Phillip, as the elder brother, had introduced Raoul to girls and anything else he'd thought might send their father into crisis mode.

"Phillip...," his father sobbed.

The bag slid from his shoulder to his feet as everything in him turned cold. His father had not cried at Phillip's funeral...he had not even cried at their mother's...

As a man, he wanted to go up and put his arms around him, to provide comfort. As a boy, Raoul did not quite have the courage to face those tears. He bolted down the stairs and out the front door, not stopping until he reached the garage.

Phillip's motorcycle was still in the same spot, with the keys still in it. Tears blinded his eyes as he climbed on and the bike roared to life.

- -

* * *

Erik was forced to stay in the hospital overnight, but her father arranged for them both to sleep in the waiting room with guards standing outside the door. Christine was nearly asleep when she rolled to her side on the sofa and felt something poking her in the side.

Frowning, she reached into her jacket pocket...and pulled out the note from Kate Sorelli.

"Papa!" Christine sat upright, her loud, excited tone startling her father from slumber.

"What? Who's there?" Gus blinked, disoriented for a moment. "Is something wrong?"

"I forgot about this!" She rushed across the room and handed him the note, kneeling at his feet. Breathless, she watched her father's tired face harden, and immediately wished she had remembered it much earlier in the day – or given it to him the next morning.

"Kate Sorelli gave you this?"

"At school today," Christine confirmed. "Do you think it's true?"

"God, I hope it is," Gus sighed. "Still, we'll have a devil of a time getting it out of their hands. They will deny it's existence."

"But Papa...if it's real...won't they have to turn it over? If Mr. Chaney watched it, he would know Erik was innocent. Because if it showed anything other than his innocence...if Erik had really killed him..."

"Then he would have turned it over for the prosecution's evidence," Gus finished, feeling defeated already. He patted his daughter's head. "We'll worry about this in the morning, Christine. Get some rest. Tomorrow...we take Erik home with us."

Christine lay down again, but it seemed she had no more drifted off than light was beaming through the blinds in the waiting room, and her father was gone.

She stretched uncomfortably on the sofa, then smoothed her hair the best she could. Her father had taken her aside the previous day and informed her that they would all be under house arrest in one way or another while Erik stayed with them. She was to stay home from school until the trial was over, and could very well have to change to another high school to begin the next year. The only time they would be allowed to leave was when Erik had to go to court...and the trial itself was being postponed until security had been tightened down and Erik had recovered from the toxin that he had ingested.

A nurse arrived at Erik's room with a wheelchair just as Christine was walking down the hall, and without a word of protest Erik lowered his body into the seat and allowed himself to be pushed outside to a police cruiser.

"I'll be following you," Detective Kohn said, then slid behind the wheel of his car.

Christine felt Erik's eyes on her as she walked around to her father's Range Rover. He always seemed to be watching...it was something she had noticed from the first day she had seen him at her school three months ago. He watched, and when her gaze met his, he never looked away. He was like that with everyone, and she had wondered if those other girls felt a strange sort of tug when looking into his yellow eyes...

Almost as if he were silently pleading for something he dared not form into words.

- - -

* * *

"You'll have to wear this at all times," Detective Kohn said apologetically as he affixed the monitoring bracelet to Erik's leg. "It will send a signal to our headquarters if you cross the perimeter of the yard, so watch your step. My officers will be just down the street, keeping an eye out..."

"I've got it," Erik replied, shrugging the detective away. He was more interested right now in the house of his reluctant captors. The charming house, with normal things and clean floors. With windows that rose to the ceiling and curtains that swept across the floor. It was by no means a masterpiece...but it was better than the roach infested quarters where he had lived for most of his life.

"All phone calls will be monitored as well, so be careful what you do, Erik," Detective Kohn reminded him again.

"Who would I call?" he asked sarcastically. "Surely not my best friend Timmy! Why, he's gone on vacation right now anyway! And John and Joey...well..."

"I was actually referring to your mother," Detective Kohn replied patiently. "You can call her...just be careful what you say to her. You shouldn't mention where you are or who you are with. She could cause problems and force the judge to send you back to jail."

"And what a pity that would be," Erik muttered. "I should have you take me back now anyway. This is not going to end well."

"Would you stop sounding so fatalistic, and at least try?" Gus said, coming through the door. "I promise, we aren't completely dull, are we Christine?"

Erik's gaze snapped to hers, to find her face red.

"Of course not," she murmured.

They all stood awkwardly in the hall for several moments, until Gus cleared his throat. "Well, I'll take you upstairs to your room. I'm sure you are ready for a few moments alone."

Erik stared after him as he started up the steps, disbelieving they were going to let him actually use one of their bedrooms.

"Well? Are you going?" Detective Kohn asked, nudging him forward.

Erik shot him a warning look over his shoulder, but finally trudged up the stairs after Gus.

It was not hard to determine which door led to Christine's room. Unless Gus had a penchant for pink and white, and displayed the name, "Diva in the Making," across the front...Christine's room was right across the hall from his own.

It also did not escape Erik's notice that the room had been fitted with a brand new deadbolt. Fresh wood shavings were easily discernible against the dark blue carpet, and Erik knew that while Gus was perhaps giving him a safe haven...he did not trust him so much as he liked everyone else to think.

At least not where his daughter was concerned.

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Don't be afraid to hit that review button! 


	9. A Dark and Pale Man

A few more chapters, then this will jump ahead to present day. Thanks for your patience!

"_Let foolish, unsuspecting men step with care in the maze of my creation."_

* * *

Christine and her father were watching _My Girl_. Or rather, Christine was watching, and Gus was sleeping. Erik stared at Christine, ignoring the movie as best he could, and longing to just get up and go back to his room. He had never understood how someone could lose themselves in front of a television, when they could be drawing, writing, or building. His idle hands were clenching and unclenching around the arms of his chair as he watched Christine.

Eating ice cream, straight from the carton, with her bare legs tucked up beside her on the couch.

"_Dad, I don't want to upset you, but my left breast is developing at a significantly faster rate than my right. It can only mean one thing: cancer. I'm dying."_

He felt his face heat at the words from the screen, and suddenly Christine began to stare at him from the corner of her eye.

"Is this bothering you?" she asked, prepared to lift the remote. "I've seen it already if you want to watch something else..."

"I don't..."

"There might be a football game on or something," Christine said uncertainly.

"I don't care for sports."

"Terminator is on..."

Erik got to his feet and moved away from the glare of the television. At least it was dark in the room, and she could not see he'd grown increasingly nervous as she continued to stare. "I don't watch television."

"Oh." Christine frowned. "Do you...have...? Never mind. I remember seeing it at your mother's apartment."

It felt as if his heart dropped a million feet to the floor. "What did you say?"

"Your...stepfather...was watching television when Detective Kohn and I went to pick up some of your things."

"My mother isn't married to him," he whispered, wondering if Christine had actually gone into his room.

Had Ethan spoken to her? Told her what a little freak he was...that there was something horrible and disgusting beneath the mask...? Had his mother been there, pathetically crying one moment, and raging drunk the next...or passed out in the floor, half dressed?

"What's wrong? Did I say something wrong?"

Erik glanced back at her, and gave a quick shake of his head. "Does your father have a garage or something?"

Christine folded her arms across her chest, and frowned. "Why? Are you going somewhere?"

"No...no. I just wanted...something to do."_ To get away from you...to make myself stop staring into your eyes...to stop feeling... "_Does he have a lawnmower...something that needs work on?"

"That's what you do for fun?"

His eyes narrowed slightly. "What do you do? Spend the day watching boring movies and shopping?"

"I _am_ a girl," Christine informed him unnecessarily. "And besides that...I sing."

The anger left immediately, but he resisted the urge to sit back down and press her for answers. Instead he moved further into the dark room, until he was nothing more than a shadow against the unlit fireplace. "Sing what?"

"Well...for now I take private lessons...for opera. All the best schools are on the east coast though. Papa is letting me attend a preparatory school next summer in New York, but I haven't been accepted yet."

"Why not?" he asked, wincing when the question came out as a demand.

"I haven't auditioned. Or rather...I have not been invited to audition yet. But Papa thinks I will. He still knows a lot of people in the music industry from when my mother was alive."

"Your mother?" Erik questioned, already knowing the answer.

"She was an opera singer." Christine returned her attention to the screen, her expression so openly sad that it tugged at his heart. "She was a star."

Erik stopped himself from asking what happened to her. He already knew, and he had invaded a personal part of Christine that he never should have, when he had dug through old newspaper accounts and read of the car crash that had left Gus with a broken leg, Christine with bumps and bruises but otherwise unharmed...and her mother dead. Sylvia Dally had been ejected from the car, struck her head, and never regain consciousness.

Now that his curiosity had been sated...after he had explored everything downstairs and almost everything upstairs...he was beginning to feel awkward, knowing that he knew more about these people than he would ever let on.

He knew that Christine liked horror movies but that her father preferred old black and white spy stories...they were both avid readers, and were frequent attenders of plays, operas, and live concerts. Gus Dally took Christine to fairs and let her sing. Often she won some sort of contest, and they would take the money and go out for breakfast at midnight after a performance. They lived by no set of rules but their own.

They loved each other...were warm and caring...passionate about music and life.

They were everything that he was not, and the differences between them never looked greater than now, when he was standing in the dark, brooding, and she was watching him from the safety of the sofa.

Without another word Erik walked out of the room, out of the kitchen door, and into the quiet night. He knew that he could go no more than fifty yards away from the house from all directions, and judged the little shop beside the house at no more than thirty. Moving through the darkness like the shadow that he was, Erik found the one place on the Dally's property that he could go into without fear of being bothered by Christine.

By the time Gus awoke from his brief nap and wandered cautiously outside to his tool shed, Erik had already finished rebuilding the carburetor on his three wheeler, and was replacing the ensemble back into the guts of the motor.

- -

* * *

Raoul watched the light in the little building beside the house, and the figure that moved restlessly inside of it. Had he intentionally taken Phillip's bike to come here? Or was it something else that pulled him to the source of all of his mental anguish? By now he had heard that someone had tried to kill Phillip's classmate, and he could honestly not say that he was sorry. But...what if it had been his father who had done it?

Would that affect how he felt at all, if he knew that his own father had paid to have someone murdered? At military school, he was being disciplined on two very confusing levels.

The one that stated a man, a soldier, must live with honor. And the one that said God, country, and family set moral codes that every soldier must obey.

So which was it? To live with honor, and believe that justice would prevail? Or to defend the memory of his brother, and want revenge, even if it meant murder?

As he stood there, watching, a girl came out of the house. Her face was briefly illuminated beneath the light of the porch, and Raoul could not help but stare at her.

This was Christine...the attorney's daughter. She looked pure and innocent, hesitant to go out into the night where the monster waited.

Suddenly her father and that masked killer came out of the little building together, Erik Ramsey with his head down and shoulders haunched, as he always looked in the court. Gus Dally walked beside him, a grim set to his chin.

And Christine, that sweet angel, fled back into the house before either one of them spotted her.

Raoul watched as they went inside the house, then he walked back to his bike. Standing near it, was a man, who had apparently also been watching the house. Raoul kept his head down as he climbed on, and only once the helmet was firmly in place did he bother glancing over at the strange looking person who stood near the curb.

If anyone thought Erik Ramsey looked odd in his black mask, then they ought to see this one. The person turned, his pale face reflecting moonlight, and eyes so dark it seemed they held no color, only emptiness.

"He is safe from you," the man stated, then turned back to watch the house. "Go away before something terrible happens."


	10. A Cloud of Warning

**I realize I updated fairly quickly to get the story off, so bear with me while I continue to develop it. I won't be updating as quickly as I see what reviewers are thinking, so if you really want to help then let me know how I am doing. Thanks!**

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_"Forget me..."_

* * *

Despite Gus's best attempts to keep his knowledge of the alleged tape out of the media's hands, they seized on it a mere hour after he made discreet inquiries into it's existence. An attorney for the Chaney family called, furious at him for ever implying that the Phillip Chaney Sr. might have such a tape and said his client was going to file a lawsuit for defamation of character if he persisted.

Gus snorted into the phone and hung up on him, but secretly he thought it was very telling that such a vehement response had been made – and so quickly.

Once word of a possible tape reached Erik's ears, the boy's entire demeanor immediately changed to that of a wild animal. Gus could almost see him panicking internally, though he said nothing, and he knew that if given the choice, the tape would never make it into his defense.

During the day Erik amused himself in his room, and at night he spent almost every second in Gus's shop. When Gus had tried to keep him indoors, it had been met with such disappointment on Erik's part that he had ultimately relented. Nothing interested him except for scribbling in his notebook, which was in no way what Gus had expected a teenager to be writing of. Instead of a journal filled with dark thoughts, Erik appeared to have a complete understanding of mathematics – in all forms. There were things written inside that made no sense to his untrained eyes, but Gus could tell that the boy went beyond simple human intelligence.

When Gus had asked him again about previous school's, Erik had looked away and said that his mother had home schooled him. Though he didn't believe it for a moment, Gus did not press. He was respectful to him and to Christine, and even to Detective Kohn, but never offered to start a conversation or to keep one going.

Now Gus had an even bigger dilemma to solve.

It seemed in addition to being masterful at basically every subject under the sun in a curriculum sense – Erik was a musical genius as well.

And dammit if his daughter didn't find _that_ intriguing.

- - -

It started when Mrs. Anne Giry had come by to play piano so Christine could practice singing. Her own music teacher had refused to set foot in a house that held a potential murderer, and Gus could not allow Christine out of his sight. His only option was begging Sylvia's dear friend to perform the task, though he knew from personal experience that Anne Giry was not nearly good enough to ever play professionally.

Erik had stayed out of the way until Anne's fingers had touched the keys, and the first note that Christine hit that was slightly off, he had appeared in the doorway with an expression of disgust in his eyes.

Christine had immediately fallen silent, and her accompanist had glanced up with wide eyes at the boy she had recently heard so much about.

"You're welcome to sit and listen, Erik," Gus said cautiously.

"To that?" he asked scornfully. "Such music is not fit for human ears."

"Oh!" Christine had protested indignantly. "That is not nice!"

His eyes settled on her for a moment, then moved past her to the equally outraged pianist. "I was not referring to the singing."

Anne Giry stood, glaring at him. "You think you can do better?"

Without a word Erik crossed the room and sat at the piano only when Anne moved out of his way. Gus tensed as he plucked at a couple of keys, and then began to play in earnest, closing his eyes and not paying the slightest bit of attention to the book in front of him, nor the people who were staring.

He became a different person as he played, and Gus knew that with those notes, Erik was carried away to another world. One look at Christine's dreamy expression, and Gus knew that she too was carried away. Anne was staring at him with an expression between irritation and awe. Before the song was over, Gus guided her into the kitchen, leaving his daughter alone with Erik.

"You trust my judgment, don't you, Anne?" he asked quietly. "You've known me a long time. What do _you_ think of him?"

"I think he's definitely strange, but I suppose that he could never help that. As for his innocence..."

"That I do believe in," Gus said with a sigh. "I just...don't know how I feel about him around Christine. She's very impressionable."

Anne leaned against the counter and stared down at the tiles on the floor. "Well, I certainly wouldn't want him near Meg, but I know why you've taken him in. I would just be careful, Gus. Even if you believe in his innocence...there is something about him that I don't quite trust."

Unsatisfied with the feeling that his daughter was going to develop some attachment to Erik, and the feeling would be more than strongly reciprocated, Gus could only agree with her assessment.

They listened as Erik finished the song, Christine asked him to play another, and they boy who seemed to obey no one readily complied.

#-#-#-#

"Where did you learn to play like that?"

Erik didn't look at her, feeling suddenly embarrassed at the way he'd taken over her music lesson. "I've always known how. Since I was very young."

Christine stared at him doubtfully. "Your apartment isn't big enough for a piano, and I can't see your neighbors listening as you played that way and not complaining.

Erik smiled secretly. "I haven't always lived here. My mother and I used to have a nice house in Los Angeles. Echo Park. We moved here when I turned nine."

"Why?" she blurted out, then flushed when he shot her a narrow glance. "I'm sorry. I don't mean to be nosy."

"It's not something I care to discuss," Erik replied quietly. "Would you like me to play again, so that you can sing?"

"If you don't mind." She smiled at him slowly. "I'm supposed to audition in two months for the preparatory school, and I can't practice without music. Mrs. Giry is nice, but she isn't very musical."

"Why isn't your music teacher here for your lesson?"

Christine looked away quickly, "He couldn't make it," she lied. "Actually, Papa is going to hire someone else."

Erik didn't press her, and began to play again, wanting to hear her voice. Ah, how it lifted him. Her voice...his music. He knew that nothing would ever compare to the way it made him feel. Nothing, for he knew that Christine would never see him as more than a pathetic, ugly person, no matter how musically talented he might be.

He let her warm up, sing to her heart's content, and resisted the urge to correct her for anything he thought she was doing wrong. It was enough that she could look him in the eyes now without quickly turning away.

It was enough that Christine had smiled at him...enough that she stood so near he could see that she had freckles on her arms and face, enough that his music could reach her, even if nothing else ever would.

#-#-#-#

The sounds of crickets outside the little shop was distracting, but Erik continued to work steadily. By the time he left the Dally's, they would undoubtedly be surprised to learn that all of their lawn tools now worked, and if he found time, Gus had shown him an old Impala that had been his first car that needed rebuilt.

Not that he expected to be here that long, but the thought of spending the duration of the trial cooped up in the house with Christine, pretty might she be, and Gus, who seemed far too concerned with what he was _thinking _and _feeling _– terrified him. Nothing had prepared him for living with a girl, especially this one. He knew that his mother had once risen early, showered, eaten breakfast with a towel covering her wet hair...but he could hardly remember the days at the house in Echo Park.

Or rather, he could remember them if he tried very hard, but they were best forgotten. He could still hear the creak of rope and wood, the feet kicking violently above the floor the day his mother had decided to commit suicide. If the rope had not broken, she would have died, and God knows what would have happened to him then.

Some days he thought it might have been best. She would have stopped suffering...stopped being so sad, and perhaps a family could have fostered him that would have found him pathetic enough to love. Other days he was glad his mother had lived...so that she could suffer as he did, and her punishment was remaining his mother for trying to leave him that way. He had lost count of the times he had seen in her eyes the thought that she hated him...or that she had actually screamed the words. For much of his life she had kept him on a marionette's string, finding him repulsive when she was sober, then clinging to him endlessly as a drunk.

"Hello, Erik."

He turned sharply, a wrench held tightly in his hand as his gaze fell on a man in the shadows outside. "What do you want?"

"A conversation, nothing more."

The man stepped forward, allowing part of his face into the light. Erik was looking into the whitest reflection he had ever seen before, and eyes that seemed to be completely dilated, so they appeared black. Straight, blue – black hair fell nearly to his chest, and he was dressed all in black leather.

"Who are you?" Erik asked, turning back to the motor he was working on.

"I am Andras. I have come as a friend," the man replied, his voice soft and gentle.

Too gentle. He sounded like one of those preachers his mother liked to watch when she was feeling particularly religious, which occurred about once every two or three months.

Erik gave him a considering glance. This man was definitely not a preacher, but he could not overcome the sensation that he was peddling something. "I have no need of friends. You'd best leave before the officers come."

"Those incompetent fools? I wouldn't worry about them. You could walk out of here tonight, and they wouldn't know until tomorrow."

The man continued to stare, and Erik began to feel uncomfortable. There had been a few times in the past he had attracted the attention of people like this, and his mother had probably given him the best advice when she said that they were not drawn to him for the right reasons. Sometimes she could make perfect sense, even if she was attached to her delusions.

"What do you want with me?" Erik asked, turning around to face him. "Who are you?"

"I have been searching for someone like you, Erik. I can see greatness in you. I can see -"

Erik stood straighter, his irritation rising quickly. "Get out of here before I bury this in your heart," he said, raising the wrench threateningly. "I don't want you here. I don't care what you're offering, I don't want it."

"You don't want power? Money? I can't believe that," Andras replied, smiling at him. Ah, they all said this at first. They said it...until they finally admitted that indeed they did want those things.

"Get out!" Erik shouted.

The sound of the screen door shutting stopped any further threats Erik might have made to the man. He slipped into the shadows, but not before whispering, "I'll be here when you are ready, Erik Ramsey. You will join me, one way or another."

The words sounded more ominous than promising. By the time Gus made it out to the shop, Erik had resumed working on the motor, though his mind was racing miles ahead.


	11. Submit to Hell

Wow, two reviews! I guess I'm really sucking at this story. We'll see if I continue to write or not I guess. Hopefully by skipping all those dull background chapters that would have laid a solid foundation to the story, and jumping to the present, I will intrigue you at least a little.

_"It's really quite difficult to be a murderer without killing people from time to time, you know."_

* * *

Bucharest, 2007

As far back as Erik could remember, choices had been made for him. At birth, his entire destiny had been laid out the moment his mother decided that loving a child with such extreme differences would not be possible. During childhood, the constant rejection had thickened his skin, made his heart less susceptible to hope and need. In his teenage years the self imposed distance from other people had never seemed more unfair, and to be precise, it was the moment he heard Christine Dally singing that Erik realized he wanted to be normal more than he wanted anything else.

When Andras and his cult of obedient, dull witted followers had plowed their armored cars into Gus Dally's jeep and the police cruiser that Detective Kohn had been transporting him in, his destiny had once again been decided. He could still remember the unearthly jarring and screech of metal on metal. Glass had exploded all around him, but it was the image of a green jeep carrying Christine and Gus, hurtling across the highway multiple times that stayed in his mind.

It had been the last day of the trial, a day of much anxiety and then ultimate tragedy. He'd spent the night before alone in the shop until Christine had slipped out of the house to speak with him.

_# - # - # - #_

_"Your father doesn't want you here," he'd said coldly. "Go back inside."_

_"My father knows I'm here," she had replied quietly. "I wanted to thank you for the music you gave me this summer, Erik. The last two months have been..."_

_Erik had stared down at the floor, wanting very much to know what the last two months had meant to her. He could never tell her what they meant to him, but surely she already knew. Sometimes his feelings were too difficult to hide, but he had never behaved inappropriately with her. Especially after Gus had given him an embarrassing speech on men's duty to protect the virtue of women. _

_"Been what?" Erik had finally prompted._

_"Very special," she whispered shyly. "I wish that you could stay here. Maybe tomorrow..."_

_"Christine," he had sighed tiredly. It was the first time he had spoken her name to her face, and felt awkward again when she moved to stand shoulder to shoulder with him against the work cabinet. "After tomorrow I won't see you again. The trial has been a disaster. No one believes that I'm innocent!"_

_"I do!"_

_"Well what you believe doesn't matter," he said bitterly, then regretted it as hurt flashed across her features. "I didn't mean it like that..."_

_"Then what did you mean?"_

_Erik drew a deep breath, staring at her from the corner of his eye. "The only people that matter are the jury members. I'm going to be convicted tomorrow and locked away."_

_"No," she whispered, covering her mouth with one hand. "Please don't say that. I don't want that..."_

_  
"People like me don't get second chances. I've known from the beginning what would happen to me."_

_"It's not fair."_

_"The world is not fair."_

_Christine had touched his shoulder hesitantly, and he had looked over at her sharply, first at the small hand, then the blond headed owner who was looking bravely at him. "I will dedicate my first performance to you, if you wish."_

_His throat had tightened, and tears had suddenly stung his eyes. Erik was startled to find them, so ready to fall when it had been years since he had railed against his fate with such emotion._

_"I would like that, Christine," he had agreed quietly. _

_She had not known what to say after that, afraid to say more in case he was wrong about the verdict. Erik's eyes had remained on her face, looking as if wanted to share a wealth of advice and secrets, but he had said nothing more. _

_# - # - # - #_

Andras had pulled him from the smoldering wreckage of the squad car, and thrown him half unconscious in the back of a sport utility vehicle. Immediately he had felt a needle enter his arm and the world had gone dark.

When his eyes finally did open, he was laying on a long red runner in a gray stoned hall, looking like something out of a medieval picture. Sitting on a decorated throne was the man he'd encountered in the shop, and kneeling before him were twenty or so people, chanting nonsensical words. At his side, a woman with distinct Asian features and blood – red painted lips had smiled upon seeing movement from their new subject.

Defiant he had remained to their strange demands, until they had thrown him into a cell for three unrelenting years. Deprived of food, light, occupation, Erik had gone nearly mad listening to the sound of his own screams and little else. He'd finally broken when Lina had been allowed to take him to India.

Out of his cage for the first time, she had introduced him to the strange Aghori, a tribe which practiced cannibalism that he had not indulged in. She had also shown him hatred...murder...drugs. Lina was capable of great evil and even greater depravity. With her guiding his already twisted mind, darkness had been unleashed upon the world. She had chained his soul to the floor of Hell, and knowing there would never be light again, Erik had submitted to her will.

She had made a mistake though...thinking him completely over the edge, she left him unattended one night, and he'd escaped.

The first person he had tried to reach was Gus Dally, but no one had answered. After four years, Detective Kohn was retired from the force, the police station had informed him, but provided him with a home phone number. Surprised did not even describe what Navin had felt on hearing Erik's trembling voice through the phone, distorted by a bad connection.

# - # - # - #

"_Where the hell have you been? Do you know how long I searched for you? How much trouble you are in?"_

_"I don't care about that. Tell me how the Dally's are," Erik had shouted into the phone._

_"What...you don't know? You left us all there to die, Erik. Is your conscience just now bothering you?"_

_Snappishly Erik had informed him of the circumstances surrounding his disappearance, and stunned the Detective into silence. "Now tell me how they are. Is Christine...?"_

_"Christine is fine now," Detecive Kohn had said with a sigh. "She can walk again..."_

_"Oh, God," Erik had whispered through the phone. "She was paralyzed? Because of me?"_

_"Her legs were broken, but she has recovered completely. She's in college now. Juilliard."_

_Erik closed his eyes and nearly sobbed with relief. "And her father?"_

_"I'm sorry, Erik. Gus didn't survive the crash."_

_The phone had been left dangling in the street, and Erik had stumbled through the foreign city, blinded by grief. Three days later he had called back._

_"I want you to find out everything you can about a man named Andras Kovechi," he had ordered Navin. "And everything about an order called The Guardians."_

_When he returned to Romania three months later, he had been armed with more than a rather unique lasso the natives of India had taught him to throw with lethal accuracy._


End file.
